Madeline and the Marionettes
'''Madeline and the Marionettes '''is an episode in Season 3. Summary When Madeline and her friends go off to the local park, they encounter a puppeteer performing puppet shows. However, each of the puppet shows consists of him twisting the endings of classic fairy tales. For example, "The Sleeping Beauty" ended with the death of the princess. Following this, the girls are disturbed, and are reluctant to see another puppet show. However, Madeline convinces them, as the next puppet show happened to be "The Three Little Pigs". Unfortunately, "The Three Little Pigs" turns out to have been twisted too. It ends with the wolf blowing down the brick house, and threatening to eat the pet chihuahua of a boy sitting in the front row. Following this, Madeline is determined to find out the puppeteer's motives for his actions. Seeing him fuming and sulking as he packed his marionettes, she realizes that the puppeteer was angry, and is determined to find out why. The next day, the girls are reluctant to go out for another walk. Instead, Madeline finds them cleaning the school. They set off for their daily walk at a later time. By the time they arrived at the park, the puppeteer had just finished another show, scaring off other children. Madeline angrily confronts him about his deeds, scolding him for having frightened other children. The puppeteer reveals to her that he has been unable to achieve his lifelong dream of being an opera singer, and that he is forced to work as a puppeteer instead. He tries to loudly belt out a tune from "Carmen", but does so badly. A police officer approaches the two and drags them both out of the park, having heard reports about the puppeteer's actions. The puppeteer then throws his puppets in the garbage, feeling discouraged. Madeline catches up with him and urges him to treat his work with honor. The puppeteer dismisses her, saying that his work could be done by anyone. The girls decide to put on a puppet show for him and Miss Clavel, a production of "Jack and the Beanstalk". Unfortunately, the performance goes badly. it turns out, maneuvering puppets is much harder than it looks. The girls tangled the puppets and were unable to switch the background flannels. Just then, the puppeteer finds a flyer for opera auditions that afternoon. He auditions, but fails, and becomes depressed. As Madeline attempts to comfort him, they realize that the Opera House has become flooded. The puppeteer uses his skills on the stage of the Opera House, untying tangled stage ropes. Owing to its flooding, the Opera performance had to be cancelled, and replaced with a puppet production of "Carmen". The Opera singers/actors still sing, but the acting was done by the puppeteer and his puppets. The performance is a success, and ends with a rapturous applause. For the first time, the puppeteer begins to appreciate his talent for what he can do. The next time at the park, he presents a puppet version of "The Marriage of Figaro" by Mozart. Madeline wipes a tear from her eye, knowing that the puppeteer now appreciates and loves his work.￼ Song "His Bark is Worse Than His Bite" Category:Article stubs Category:Episodes